David Albright, founder of the Institute for Science and International Security and a longtime analyst of Iran’s nuclear program, rejected the argument that Tehran emerged stronger from the war, saying US and Israeli strikes had severely damaged Iran’s ability to build a nuclear weapon.
“You’d have to be delirious to think that’s the case,” Albright told the Washington Post when asked whether Iran was stronger after the war. He said that, from a technical nuclear perspective, the military campaign was “very successful” in setting back Tehran’s weapons capability.
Albright said Iran’s enrichment program, gas centrifuge network and parts of what he described as its secret weaponization effort had been badly damaged. “The centrifuge program as it was no longer exists,” he said, adding that what remains is dangerous but reduced to “remnants.”
Before the US launched Operation Midnight Hammer in June 2025, Albright said Iran had about 22,000 centrifuges, many of them operating and enriching uranium up to 60 percent. He said Iran is now “not enriching at all” and that most of those centrifuges have been destroyed.
He said roughly 10 nuclear-weapons-related sites were destroyed, including storage, conversion, research and development facilities, as well as sites Israel said were linked to weaponization work. Many scientists and engineers were also killed, he said.
Albright said Iran could previously have built a nuclear weapon within months and several weapons within six months to a year. After the strikes, he estimated it would take Tehran at least a year to try, with much less certainty that the effort would succeed.
He warned, however, that unresolved risks remain, including buried enriched uranium at Natanz and Isfahan and the underground Pickaxe Mountain site near Natanz, which was not struck and must be addressed in negotiations.
Albright said the key test in any nuclear deal is whether Iran admits it had a nuclear weapons program and fully discloses where that work took place. He warned Tehran may try to stall the process, but said the military campaign had achieved “pretty significant” results on the nuclear front.
